Life after Helsinki 2007 Eurovision

FYR Macedonia was also having its song presentation show while the Bulgarian national was on. Kaliopi was internally selected and we also knew the song title for some time now, Crn o i belo or Black and white . And quite a nice song it is. Obviously much better in Macedonian. The beginning is fantastic but while the rock orchetsra kicks in I kinda prefer they didn't and Kaliopi stayed by her piano and kept playing. Anyways, a good song.

Sofi Marinova has won the Bulgarian final with Love unlimited . Oh well... I find it rather bland summer europop... and rather corny with the lyrics but then that's me.... Bulgarians know better? We will see...

Lena Philipsson's  new single Du följer väl med (You come along, don't you) has been chosen as the Pride 2012 theme song in Sweden. Lena expressed her delight for the matter saying she's very taken for the honor and thinks the reason is they (Pride organizers) liked the song and text as it is. She has been performing in the Pride once before and remembers it was just brilliant. She doesn't take her status as a Gay Icon too seriously and says it's something she doesn't think about but adds "it's lovely though". The Stockholm Pride will take place in the end of July-early August. More information here . The theme of 2012 is Tillsammans or Together. Are you coming along?

I had been waiting for this rumour! Dima Bilan is rumoured to have applied for Eurovision 2012 for Russia. Not alone, not with Sergey Lazarev but in duet with Yulia Volkova, of t.A.T.u. fame. The song is apparently called Back to the future.Their collaboration was already planned and rumoured back in November but may now materialize in the Eurovision stage. True or not, I don't care.  Just knowing how much tis news bother some fans makes me laugh and also wish that it is true. And that he wins. And goes to Baku 2012. And wins again! Err, well maybe not... Third place would be enough so he would have all the top-3 places in his credit... oh, but Yulia already came third... I guess she wants to make it better. Whatever, soon we will know! :-)

Bulgaria will stage its national final tonight in Sofia. As guest stars we have the 2012 entrats from Cyprus, Denmark, France and Malta (at least) as the ones from Ukraine and Switzerland have cancelled for various reasons. It is supposed to be a two horse race where sassy and kitchy Sofi will try to beat weirdly elegant favourite Dess but we will see. You can listen a recap here of the 12 finalists. You can watch the show on eurovision.tv from 19.30 CET. 01. Go Week – The way you see the world 02. Todor Gadzhalov – Still love you 03. Steliyana Hristova -  Putyat 04. Rene Ranev – Alone 05. Desislava (Dess) – Love is alivе 06. Svetozar Hristov – Keep ме down 07. Simona Sivanio – Eternal 08. Yvailo Kolev ft. Hipnotik – Searching for the words 09. Sofi Marinova – Love Unlimited 10. Vyara Pantaleeva – Vyara 11. New 5- Chance for better life 12. Tsvetelin Atasanov-Elvisa ft. DZ - Love goes around

Romanian Tv has also revealed it's 15 finalists and there are several familiar names amongst the artists and autjors, from Catalin Josan to Costi Ionita, from Gerard James Borg to Jonas Gladnikoff and Marc Paelinck. These are selected from the 109 songs sent in but only 46 apparently were eligible by the rules. The Romanian final will take place on March 10, 2012. Catalin Josan tries for the fourth time after being 4th in 2008 with Run away , 2nd in 2009 with Stop and again 2nd in 2010 with Around around . He has even managed to score a hit in Italy with Don't wanna miss you after that. Will it be finally his year? Catalin Josan - Call My Name (Keo Ralfo / Muresan / Alexander) Mandinga - Zaleilah (Costi Ionita / Ionescu Elena / Secada Omar) Vick y Red - If You Ever Feel (Victor / Silviu / Cracius / Razvan / Constantin) Bianca Purcarea - Don't Say Sorry (Marc Paelinck / Bianca Purcarea / Bart Herman) Electric Fence - Sun-ta (Antoniu / Lucian / Vasile / Cien...

ERT revealed demos of their four national final songs without further information, like who is going to sing them and who the authors are. Pretty good so far. The quality of the entries is another matter. I kinda like No parking , but it certainly isn't a very original piece of art. Killer bee falls to the same category. Baby I'm yours certainly isn't an original title and so is not the melody or the arrangement. It's a long three minutes. Aphrodisiac apparently is the instant fan favourite. A taylor made Greek Eurovision entry but not a very good one. Greece, we know you can't afford to host in 2013 but could you still do an effort? :-) Listen to the entries here .

Lena Philipsson's new album Världen snurrar is out and it's very very good. I've got a signed copy and love it to bits. The new single is Du följer väl med?, half written by Finns btw. There's also a Soundfactory club remix of it already and hopefully she'll do a video, too. And don't forget the fabumous Live tomorrow that has been also remixed .

Slovenia's national final EMA was once again totally stolen my the crazy cool preenter Klemen Slakonja but the winner in the end is Eva Boto with Verjamem , a song that could be described as very similar to Moltiva which can't be but positive. The Prusnik sisters turned out to be rather entertaining and insane in a Jedward kind of way but their Konitchiwa that made the superfinal just wasn't good enough to beat Verjamem's beauty and Eva's brilliant vocals. Maja Keuc can be proud of her follow up.

The Netherlands have chosen Joan Franka, a Cher incarnation what comes to wardrope for Baku 2012. She beat the the other duel winners Pearl and Ivan in the superfinal with televotes despite being last by the jurors and also the international 100 person strong jury of reference. And the Dutch are masters of selecting songs with same titles someone else has that year or almost, You and me . I think she needs to rethink the look and staging... Otherwise it was a show very nicely put together. The colorful lightning based clap-o-meter for the international jury was a great idea, and the running of the % in screen was a good one, too (Finland 2006-2007 anyone?).

The rumours go wild in internet about the possible Russian national selection songs and artists. The usual Dima Bilan, Alexander Panayatov and the rest are rumoured as every year. But there are also two Finno-Ugric groups involved and even if their chances are slim, who knows? First of all the lovely grannies over the Ural mountains, Udmurts Buranovskie Babushki could be back but also a Finno-Ugric supergroup Osan Yöstä has sent in a song Revontulet (Northern lights ). The group has people of Finnish, Komi, Carelian, Udmurt and Izhorian tribus of Finno-Ugric people and they all sing in their own language. For a proud Carelian this can't be but good news!

It has been confirmed that När jag blundar will stay in Swedish also in Baku 2012. The song was written by Pernilla's brother Jonas Karlsson for their mother's 50th anniversary party last summer. So, this will be Finland's second ever entry in Swedish in Eurovision - and the first Eurovision entry in Swedish since 1998 . When beat won in 1990 with Fri? it felt like YLE had decided a song in Swedish had to win. In previous year's there were so many good songs in Swedish but come 1990, there was only Beat while in Finnish we had some great songs, like this one , that the jury pulled down in favour of a song in Swedish. That's an impression. The trip to Zagreb didn't end so well, last place with 8 points from Norway and Israel, Sweden didn't give it points. This time Sweden can't give it points in the semifinal either... Italy won last time Finland had a song in Swedish, will 2012 repeat the history? :-)

It is looking like Arisa, who came second to Emma in Sanremo 2012 beats her in the charts. Her album Amami is at #1 in Italian iTunes while the single La notte is #1 in the single's chart. And I must say it's the song from Sanremo that plays the most in my own little head these days. And curiously it often changes at some point to Alice's La mano . And indeed there are similarities in the lyrics and the atmosphere of these two songs. Totally different but yet so similar. Fascinating.

Slovenia had a very long selection for the artists and we are down to the final two, or three actually as sisters Eva & Nika Prusnik are battling it out against Eva Boto . The sisters will sing Konichiwa , a weird mix of Japanese clichees and Jesus Christ,  Malo screce , a retro schlager and Love hurts , a pop song flirting with hard rock. Eva Boto also has three songs: Verjamem , an atmospheric ballad, Run , an American style ballad (or is it Disney-esque?) and A si sanjal me , a light uptempo pop song that is proprbaly the most classic Eurovision song here. And rather catchy as that. In short the sisters are much more riskier and more fun perhaps but Eva sings each song beautifully and could go to Baku with any of them and propably do a decent job. Listen all the songs here . And read Marco Mosca's excellent post here . You can watch ti on eurovision.tv startting at 20.00 CET or on www.rtvslo.si (choose audio/video and then TV1)

The Netherlands will select their entry tonight. Out of zillions of songs a jury has chosen six, and they will be presented in duels. This is a bit like UMK, one can only question how come just these six songs made the cut? Anyways, the outcome may be a bit more Eurovision friendly than in Finland (this said, in Finland the most Eurovision friendly one perhaps won...). If it was for me these would be won by Raffaella, Ivan and Pearl, and Raffaella or Pearl going to Baku 2012. But what do I know? There will be a mixed 50-50 jury-televote with an international jury of 100 persons involved as well. You can watch this on eurovision.tv from 20.20 CET. Joan Franka - You and me -vs- Raffaëla - Chocolatte Kim de Boer - Children of the world -vs- Ivan Peroti - Take me as I am Pearl - We can overcome -vs- Tim Douwsma - Undercover lover

It has been funny to read the comments here and there in chatrooms and blogs when both Finns and especially foreigners have been outraged that we Finns send a song in Swedish to the Eurovision song contest 2012 in Baku. Finland is a bilingual country. That seems to be big news to most of them. Some even argue (with Finns) that it is not. I tell, it is. Also, this is not the first time we send a song in Sweish. Fri? by Beat in 1990 was in Swedish. We have had countless songs in Swedish in the national finals over the years, and even some of them have been runner ups, Mitt äppelträd in 1982 and Svart och vitt in 1988 come to mind easily. There is a chance this När jag blundar might be translated fully or partly into English but Pernilla herslef has expressed a wish it stays in Swedish and I doubt YLE will force her to change that. And what comes to Pernilla being a Swedish speaker. So? What about Axel Ehnström aka Paradise Oskar, Nina Åström, Ami Aspelund, Riki Sorsa, Monica Aspe...

EMA, the Slovenian selection for the Eurovision song contest this year trusts on teenager power. While some ex-Yogoslavian neighbours trust in big local names to get to the final (Nina Badrić, Željko Jokšimović, Kaliopi), the 18th edition (started in 1993, but in 1994 and in 2000 it was skipped) of Ema will see on stage, for the first time, only young and debutant artists who won Misija Evrovizija, the talent show held by RTV Slovenija in the last months. After many qualifying rounds, the hopes of Slovenia are in the hands of three 16-year-olds girls: Eva Boto and the twins Nika and Eva Prusnik. Choosing to bet on newcomers, RTV had to find reliability on the songs, so the six titles (amongst 52) that we will heard come out from renowned pens.  This should be the order: 1. Eva Boto - A si sanjal me (Matjaž Vlašič, Urša Vlašič, “father and mother” of Energy, Mr. Nobody, No One, and many other famous Slovenian songs) 2. Nika & Eva Prusnik - Konichiwa (B...

Pernilla Karlsson won the Finnish final aka UMK with När jag blundar (Wehn I close my eyes), a sinple ballad written by her brother to their mother. She beat the superfavourite Stig in the second round of voting where the third wheel was Ville Eetvartti. YLE produced quite an entertaining show, shame the songs were on the same level I must say. The song is sung in Swedish and it will be interesting to see if it stays or will it be translated into English for Baku 2012. Update : Reading the comments on various chatrooms and papers Finns didn't really swallow this win so easily and no one seems to like it nor believe in her chances in Baku 2012. This said, Finns would have said so about anyone who won (and did with Lordi for example) but this time the negative comments beat the few positive ones 9-10) I will update later with full results and news. Update 2 : YLE has finally published the televotes. Or not really; not the number of them as usual. Also the final was watched by so...

Follow the final with me blogging live right here from 20.00 CET. And watch it here . The show comes from Helsinki Ice hall and is presented by Joona Kortesmäki and Anne Lainto. The Rasmus, Anna Abreu, Robin and Paradise Oskar with Felix Zenger will be the guest stars. The process until now has ben long and confusing but it all comes together tonight. Maybe. There will we televote and superfinal with top-3 with a new televote. Judges have no say whatsoever anymore. 21.00 Here we go! The show about to start in a very snowy Helsinki! We start with a short clip of how we got this far. Anyone was able to participate and 540 demos were sent in. Then the process is recapped in short as no one understood a thing about it before... and now we enter the Helsinki Ice hall where dancers are on stage amonhst dry ice. We already saw the stage last night but now it comes alive with the lights and the audience. 21.07 This is more like classic dancing than disco dancing it seems. And the three ladies...

Just a few hours before the final Iltalehti's readers have said their opinion: Stig will win tonight's UMK and represant Finland in the Eurovision song contest 2012 in Baku. He got over half of the votes (52%) while his runner ups Pernilla Karlsson and Kaisa Vala got only 12,8% and 10,0%. The fans are apparently for Pernilla Karlsson, Iconcrash and Kaisa Vala, while Stig is second to last in their poll. In Oikotimes poll Pernilla and Kaisa are in the lead and Stig last. The results are similar elsewhere. Will Finns stick to their own mind and send a domestic hit that will bomb in Baku big time or search for something else? We will know later tonight.... Stig used to be Stig Dogg and do this sort of thing before: Stigidilaatio , Kullii , Häsleri , Rakkauden Bermudan kolmio.....  if you don't know Finnish for once you can be very happy about it! All this considered Laululeija isn't that bad after all, is it?

EFR12 playing Eurovision remixes áll day so tune in here . While waiting for the Finnish final tonight. or the Swedish, Estonian and Lithuanian semifinals. Or simply click the logo on your right hand side :-)

The long and confusing Finnish national final concept called UMK aka Uuden musiikin kilpailu comes to an end tonight in a live show from Helsinki's Ice Hall. I don't know if it's going to be a full house aas at least in last night's programme they said go and get your ticket and come see the show live as tickets are still available. There will be 14 cameras, the sage looks pretty enough and YLE apparently has put an effort for the final with guest stars like The Rasmus world premier of their comeback single I'm a mess, the "biggest show ever seen by a Finnish artist" by Anna Abreu, last year's Euroviisut winner Paradise Oskar will perform, too, and even the current #1 in the single's chart Robin is there. Six songs made it this far and even if I may not agree with the results I do have a favourite, Kaisa Vala. I also like Mica Ikonen. Many Eurovision fans favour Ville Eetvartti and Pernilla Karlsson. Then we have Iconcrash and Stig. I just don'...

Estonia will select another five songs to the final tonight. Amongst tonight's artists we have previous Eurovision entrant Malcom Lincoln and Soul Militia, the 2001 Eurovision winner. Or their backing group depending which way look at it or read the artist's name. And Lenna, who according the Finnish movie posters has already won Eestilaul 2012.... UPDATE : Traffic, Lenna, Tenfold Rabbit, Birgit and Telle made it to the final. 1. Traffic – NASA 2. Lenna– Mina Jään 3. Malcolm Lincoln – Bye 4. Tenfold Rabbit – Oblivion 5. Birgit Õigemeel – You’re Not Alone 6. Soul Militia – The Future is Now 7. Mimicry - The Destination 8. Orelipoiss – Zombi 9. Teele Viira – City Nights 10. Cat Eye – Ride

Tonight the last semifinal in Sweden takes place. This 2012 MF season has been the worst ever if you ask me and the mediocre offerings continue tonight. At least Danny is better than last year when he came second. I predict him going to the final with Dynazty. Charlotte should have to do with the second chance and I would send there Lisa with her. The rest we can forget... But I'm sure the Swedes will surprise us once again. However, no one beats Loreen, the only real highlight of the Swedish Eurovision 2012 season. UPDATE : Danny and Lisa to the final, Dynazty and Lotta & Christer to the 2nd chance. Charlotta 5th. (I would like to say "I told you so!" to a few readers out there! :-) 1. Charlotte Perrelli - The girl 2. OPA! - Allting blir bra igen 3. Dynazty - Land of broken dreams 4. Lotta Engberg & Christer Sjögren - Don't let me down 5. Hanna Lindblad - Goosebumps 6. Axel Algmark - Kyss mig 7. Lisa Miskovsky - Why start a fire 8. Danny Saucedo - Amazing

The Lithuanian national selection continues tonight with the fourth and last semifinal. Amongst the songs is Medieval love, that MOvetron sent to UMK and were not accepted even amongst the top-40. They sent it to Lithuania instad and hired a local lead singer (as the rules request so) and she sounds exactly like Päivi. Here is the song. Do you think it will have better faith in Lithuania than in Finland? Not if you ask the local jury that ranked them last already while Donny Montell won the jury vote and should sail to the final with Love is blind . And hopefully wins this time. Finally!

As expected Jedward did it again and will do a bis in Baku 2012 with Waterline . I find myself liking the song more than I ever expected.... :-) There were five local juries with televote to produce the winner in a 50-50 manner and the result is (juries-televote): Jedward – Waterline (12+12+8+10+12) 54 + 60 = 114 Andrew Mann – Here I am (10+10+6+12+6) 44 + 50 = 94 Donna McCaul – Mercy (8+8+12+6+8) 44 + 40 = 84 Una Gibney & David Shannon – Language of Love (6+6+10+8+8) 38 + 20 = 58 Celtic Aura ft. Maria McCool – Mistaken (4+4+4+4+4) 20 + 30 = 50

Trackshittaz beat Conchita Wurst in the superfinal (51-49%)  in Austria. I guess nothing as annoying as this will be selected to Baku 2012. But then who knows? Hard to see this appeal outside Austria..... Woki mit deim Popo . My ass...

The last qualification round of UMK came from Helsinki Ice hall where we had the stage, the greenroom but empty hall giving a very strange feel to the whole thing. Anyways after the interview with The Rasmus , the round up how the 540 songs came 40, then 12, then 8 and finally only six tonight they started telling us who the online voters had sent to the final: Mica Ikonen, Pernilla Karlsson, Ville Eetvartti while Kaisa Vala was in danger of dropping out. Then Iconcrash and Stig to the final and Freeman joins Kaisa Vala on stage tonight and faces the judges. They performed again after Anna Abreu was interviewed. She will have her biggest show ever on UMK stage. After the Madonna's SuperBowl performance it was reported she was mad about her as her planned show was very similar to Madonna's and now needed to be redone to avoid copycat label. (Yeah right!). So then to the judges Anna Laine, Jorma Hietamäki, Vallu Vaipio, Anna Puu and Tomi Saarinen. They praised Kaisa Vala, the w...

Charlotte Perrelli who did a flop in 2008 with Hero but won the Eurovision 1999 as Nilsson with Take me to your heaven is giving it another go this year with The girl . A sure fan favourite. The rehearsals didn't go totally as planned today. A backing singer smashed the microphone into her front tooth. " I just heard it crack " she commented afterwards. Now she needs to fix it before tomorrow night's live broadcast. She also revealed they have spent over 113.000 euros for the entry (or one million in local money) and can't afford to go to Second Chance. "I need to go directly to the final or be kicked out!" she said. Didn't Carola have similar tooth problems in Athens?

Today seems to be the dy of not so surprising news as they may seem at first glance. First of there is talk Armenia has decided to withdraw after all after a boycott by the singers but we will see how that goes. And in Belarus it seems Alyona Lanskaya's All my life has been changed to Litesound's We are the heroes . How am I not surprised? If they don't change the song they change the singer and this time both. As every year at least one change seem to take place. Maybe the dictator didn't like All my life ? This time I'm afraid I agree with him as I always preferred Litesound....

Tonight we have also the Irish final, or better known as Jedward Vs. the others, vol 2. Five songs in the running. Maria McCaal will appeal to the ethnic lovers, Donna McCaul to anti-Jedwards, Andrew Mann to the more rock oriented ones and Una & David to... well, I don't know? Fossils? You can watch the show live on eurovision.tv from 22.35 CET. Anyways, here they are: Celtic Whispers ft Maria McCool - Mistaken Donna McCaul - Mercy Andrew Mann - Here I am Una Gibney & David Shannon - Language of love Jedward - Waterline

Austria is one of the two countries choosing their entry for Baku 2012 tonight. Ten songs are in the running, amongst them last year's runner up Trackshittaz and bearded drag queen with a name full of meaning, Conchita Wurtz. I'm all for La Wurtz but have a soft spot for Papermoon adn Valerie. I also hope Trackshittaz stay as runner ups. Max. Eurovision stars Nadine Beiler and Eric Papilaya amongst others are in as guest stars. You can watch the show live on eurovision.tv from 20.15 CET. 01: !Deladap – Don't turn around 02: 3Punkt5 - Augenblick 03: James Cottriall – Stand Up 04: Krautschädl – Einsturzgefohr 05: Mary Broadcast Band – How Can You Ask Me 06: Papermoon – Vater, Father, Mon Père 07: Norbert Schneider – Medicate My Blues Away 08: Trackshittaz – Woki Mit Deim Popo 09: Valerie – Comme Ca 10: Conchita Wurst – That’s What I Am

Tonight there will be the last qualification round for the seven entries left in UMK aka Uuden musiikin kilpailu, ex-Euroviisut. First they were 540, then 40, then 12 and tonight they will be only six. Televoters will take five of them to the final, and the judges will send there also one of the two leftovers. So, one will be so close, 24 hours, from the final but will be left out. I would kick out either Freeman or Stig (for the simple fact he can't sing) but I'm afraid both will go on tomorrow's final. My favourites are Kaisa Vala as she is the most intteresting, fresh new artists here, and Mica Ikonen for the simple stage presence and voice!The songs still in the run are: Freeman & Uusi Fantasia - Noitanainen Iconcrash - We are the night Kaisa Vala - Habits of the human beings Mica Ikonen - Antaa mennä Pernilla Karlsson - När jag blundar Stig - Laululeija Ville Eetvartti - Lasikaupunki

Forget Spice Girls and John Barrowman. And also Geri Halliwell solo and Will Young, the latest name rumoured is Right said Fred, or RSF these days. Those muscle guys that were too sexy for everything back in 1991. Then asked us to kiss, not to talk before going deeply dippy . Next they asked us to stick it out and get bumbed and so the story goes. I must say I'm stuck in those early 1990's but they have been releasing music ever since and their 8th album Stop the world was released in 2011. Wouldn't it be nice to have these Mr Propers hunting down the Jedwards in Baku?